In the beginning…

Some of us had a chance to check out the new Contemporary Jewish Museum Friday morning, and it’s not what you think it is. It’s not a collection of exclusively Jewish artists or fancy Judaica. It’s not a museum with traditional galleries studded with pedestals and glass showcases and ponderous exegesis. It’s not even a museum with one of those traditonal, so last-century right-angles. What it is, is a kick.

Let’s start with the obvious. The building is hot. In a good, non-Gehenna way. The Willis Polk-designed power substation Libeskind riffs off of has long been one of the classiest buildings in San Francisco, and he knows it. Give him credit. Inside, he uses those old trusses and beams and skylights to help orient you…and then he pulls the rug out. Standing in the 65-foot-high gallery on the second floor feels like you’re in the middle of God’s whiffle ball.

Gallery evokes the shape of the letter “yud”, the letter that begins the Hebrew words for God and Jew.

Speaking of God, one of the inaugural exhibitions is titled, “In the beginning: Artists respond to Genesis”. Yes, there are a few bibles (including one illustrated by Gustave Dore), so you can see what constituted “contemporary” back in the 15th century. But there are other pieces that are much more fun, including an interactive video installation that lets you actually play God. (Think “The Daily Show’s” “God Machine .”)

Shrek, the original one

William Steig’s New Yorker cartoons and children’s book illustrations are also on display — and, even better, the museum has created a reading room as part of the exhibit made up to look like one of his cartoon interiors. You can pull up a bean bag chair (bean bag chairs!) and spend an afternoon reading “Shrek” and “Spinky Sulks” to your seven-year-old. Oh, who am I kidding. You don’t need a seven-year-old. I know I don’t.

The Museum opens next weekend with an all-night party. The South of Market just got a lot livelier. L’Chaim.